


From a Balance Beam

by burymeinziam



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Character Death, M/M, Purgatory, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, i don't even know what else to tag this as
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-12
Updated: 2014-03-12
Packaged: 2018-01-15 11:17:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1302910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burymeinziam/pseuds/burymeinziam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>in which liam is an angel who lost his wings, zayn is always dying, and liam really just wants to save him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	From a Balance Beam

**Author's Note:**

  * For [calmlikesurrender](https://archiveofourown.org/users/calmlikesurrender/gifts).



> this has been sitting around in my computer for like five months and its finally done and yeah...  
> i hope it isn't trash.

His eyes are crusted shut with blood and tears. Ripping them open is like tearing stiches, scabs falling into open wounds, melting on sight but not doing anything to stop the pain. He sits up, agony tearing though his stomach upon realizing what he has done.

With wide eyes, he glances around the barren room. A single body lay beside him. Under different circumstances Liam might have smiled and celebrated. He would sing, maybe even dance, but this wasn’t one of those times. This was a different body – not the right one. This was not the right body, but it was definitely real.

It never was real; it was always a fragment of his imagination, but everything about this was fragmented or imagined. It was vivid and present and Liam was living it.

Sort of; not really.

Liam was still dead, but so was he. He lay staring at the ceiling, his stomach a distorted collaboration of intestines and carnage.

Sweat littered Liam’s skin, soaking his feathers to his back, but it still wasn’t over. The pain was starting, the consequences always came.

Angry angels never went unpunished.

+

One would think a gift bestowed by God would be painless. Becoming an angel would be something akin to the sweetest surrender. Liam expected the feeling to be like floating along a riverbed on a raft made of feathers that would kiss his skin.

But when death embraced him and Liam stared into the misty eyes of heaven, he fought and he resisted in the hopes that he could make things right; make the pain go away.

The thing was, the irony of it all, was that it only increased. Maybe it would have been easier if he’d simply followed directions; took the hand of his caretaker and accepted his fate.

But Liam hadn’t given up and he cried out with the force of a crushing boulder as thick stems of wing broke through his skin. He felt the shift in his shoulder blades as the metal rods round their way through his bones, crumpling in on themselves, blood dancing in circular waves down his spine.

They stretched and twisted through his back until they hung limply against his skin and when the pain was gone and Liam was barely conscious, he let out a breath of relief hoping he could fly away from this world.

Maybe he could fly to heaven, he thought.

But the feathers weren’t there.

+

Foggy air sweeps in through bare skin, soaking him.

He’s cold and damp and afraid. No way to escape. No running away.

His back is a bloody mess; he can feel the lumps protruding from his shoulder blades with every shift of muscle. His naked feet are being stabbed and prodded by woodchips and dead branches, a pain he’s not used to. It’s something he didn’t used to remember.

But his wings. Where are his wings?

He looks up to the sky, a black orb, and a single drop falls onto his cheeks. Rain.

The liquid sinks into his wounds, stinging them, making him drop to his knees as though he were sin itself being burned by holy water.

And he may as well be, Liam thinks.

But then there is light; faint and dim, but there all the same.

It’s an open door, a second chance, and an open hand offering the opportunity to set balance to the scales once more.

+

Purgatory is cold and sterile and reminds Liam of a hospital or a high class office building. The floors are all shiny linoleum and the walls are a blinding white. The chairs are hard plastic and lined up in straight rows and they’re filled with people who are waiting. That’s all they ever seem to do here is wait: wait for their next assignment, wait to move on to bigger and better things like heaven or to hear those unfortunate words that are scrambled and fixed to sound pretty and professional and sympathetic but basically mean you fucked up and are going to hell. It’s all a waiting game and it’s cold and it’s hard and it’s quiet.

He and Louis both seem to blend in since everyone wears the same plain white button down and dark wash jeans with the eerily white sneakers than never seem to get scratched up and dirty no matter how hard you work them. He and Louis blend in just fine even though Liam feels as though he couldn’t be any more different. He isn’t sure what it is that makes him feel as though he sticks out like a sore thumb. Perhaps it’s the way everyone looks so content and Liam feels as though he’s constantly itching; like he’s shaking in his seat with all this waiting.

Maybe it’s the scars on his back and the phantom wings he constantly feels hanging from his shoulder blades.

Yeah, Liam thinks. Maybe it’s that.

“How long do you think we’re here for?” Louis asks and it’s like he can read Liam’s mind. Liam turns to look at him and he wouldn’t be surprised if Louis could because they’ve known each other for all of twenty-five years. They literally died together. If anyone were able to read Liam like a book, it would have to be Louis.

Liam shrugs his shoulders, tries for lighthearted and sarcastic. “Till we’ve paid our dues and realized the error of our ways, I suppose.”

Louis can’t help the wry smile that tugs at the corners of his lips and he can see the way Liam is trying to school his face into something serious because no one else in the room is really talking, let along making jokes. He can tell that Liam is trying so hard for normal even though he more than feels like dying all over again.

“I swear this is like prison,” Liam continues, his eyes roaming the room. “They have us cooped up in here for God only knows how long and all we do is wait. We sit here and we wait, moving up in line every so often, and the only thing we have to do is to think about why we’re here. And then what? We get our next assignment, we reap some unfortunate soul back on earth, and we’re back in line to do it all over again.” He sighs, shaking his head. “I swear I don’t know if I remember what life was like before this; not really. It’s like that one movie said; the one where that guy dug a tunnel out of prison? I’m institutionalized.”

“Shawshank,” Louis says easily, settling back into his chair and folding his arms over his chest as his smile turns smug. He turns his head to face Liam. “And I don’t think this is the same.”

Liam raises his brows. “How is it not? We’re stuck here; there’s no way out. We don’t even have the option of using twenty years to tunnel our way out. It’s prison.” Liam says this as if it’s plain as day and he doesn’t see why Louis wouldn’t agree with him. They may not be wearing jumpsuits and they may not be locked behind bars, but they're stuck; they’re trapped in a routine of waiting and following orders and they have a sentence to serve out before they’re set free.

Louis takes a moment to get his thoughts together before he sighs and shrugs his shoulders because he’d never be as good with words as Liam. “We have heaven,” Louis answered. “I mean, I guess this is sort of like prison because we’re stuck and all, but I don’t think it’s so bad because we have something to look forward to; something good and it’s pretty much guaranteed as long as we do as we’re told without fucking anything up.”

Liam doesn't tell him that there is no real difference between what either of them had just said. No matter how they look at it, they're still stuck and waiting for a “something better” be it heaven or freedom or something else. Liam doesn't say anything because Louis is so undeniably convinced in his idea of Heaven. Even when they had been alive Louis had an unwavering belief in a higher power – a life after death – and when he and Liam wound up in purgatory after the accident and this life after death had been confirmed Louis' belief in God and a Heaven became even more unfaltering.

Liam never had a problem with this and he still doesn't. He's glad Louis has something to find solace in – something to look forward to because sitting around waiting for something you had no real confidence in would be hell (Liam knows this first hand) and he would never wish that upon someone as good as Louis.

The thing is, though, Liam knows that there are two ends to the spectrum. If there is a Heaven, then there must be a Hell and for all that is good there must also be evil.

It's no secret that Louis and Liam both know that purgatory is sort of a waiting game. Louis is convinced that they're waiting for Heaven and that's all there is to it. One of these days, whenever that may be, their number will be called and he and Liam will be able to walk through those pearly gates and into the arms of their Lord and Savior. This is Louis' belief and even though he may not talk about it because he knows religion isn't really Liam's thing, Liam can see it in his eyes; the hope.

But there's still those two ends of the spectrum that Liam can't get out of his mind and he knows they're stuck in purgatory for a reason. They're waiting to be judged or tested and Liam isn't so sure that he'll pass and he just knows that if there are two ends to the spectrum he could just as easily be waiting to go to Hell as he could be waiting to go to Heaven.

The thought of this makes Liam wonder if he even deserves Heaven. He’d already turned it down once and, here he was, given a second chance reaping souls and bringing them into the afterlife and Liam wonders if that can be enough; if spending a seemingly endless amount of time in this middle ground between Heaven and Hell waiting to get sent back to earth only to bring another unfortunate soul back up to purgatory was enough to wipe his filthy slate clean and deem him worthy enough for Heaven.

Liam looks at Louis, his best friend, one of the few people that have been there for him for as long as he can remember, the only person to be there in both life and death, and knows that this process would be enough for him because Louis is good. The only reason he's here is because of Liam and even if Louis didn't leave the world on the best of terms, he'd never done anything evil; he had never consciously caused another person to suffer any great amount of pain. 

And then Liam thinks if there are two ends to the spectrum, the heaven and hell, life and death, then maybe he and Louis are also at opposite ends. Maybe Louis is the good and Liam is the bad. Liam knows without a doubt that Louis will get to walk through those pearly gates, he’ll get to heaven, but he isn’t so sure about himself. Even if they were to let him back in, Liam isn’t sure that he would deserve it. He doesn’t know how he would be able to walk into heaven knowing everyone was so much better.

Liam is jolted from his thoughts when he feels Louis lightly shoving his shoulder. “Hey,” he’s saying, his lips slightly curved in a friendly smile that Liam can tell is equal parts concerned. “You in there?”

Liam nods, rubbing his hand over his head and sighing as he slumps back in his seat. “Yeah. I’m just… tired, I guess.”

“How can you be tired, Li?” Louis asks with a laugh, his eyes turning playful as he cocks his head to the side. “We never sleep; not here at least.”

Liam narrows his eyes, looking slightly to his left to meet Louis’ “You know what I mean.”

Louis rolls his eyes and crosses his legs, watching as a woman who appears to be in her late thirties stands from her chair and approaches the front desk for her next assignment. He wonders when she died and what she had done to get here, how long she's been here and if she’s just as anxious to see what comes next. The line moves up one seat and once he and Liam are settled in their chairs, Louis turns to his friend and in an easy, yet serious, tone says

“You need to lighten up.”

Liam raises his brows. “What are you even talking about, Louis?”

“You’re in your head too much. You’ve got this constant frown on your face and it’s like, it’s like you’re always thinking. I don’t know about what and I’m not saying you have to tell me if you don’t want to because I know you sometimes need to work things out for yourself but… I don’t know.” Louis sighs. “I’m worried about you, I guess.”

“I’m fine,” Liam says even though it’s not all the way true and he’s sure Louis can see right through him.

“Are you sure?”

Liam nods, forcing a smile and offering Louis a friendly pat on the knee. “Positive,” he answers. “It’s probably just all of this waiting… too much time to let my mind wander.”

The line moves up another person and Liam follows suit as Louis slides down to another seat. Liam watches as Harry, the overseer, adjusts the hood of his cloak while he sorts through the paperwork covering his desk.

Liam swallows heavy in his throat knowing that one of those sheets belongs to him and that there's a name on that piece of paper; there's a name and a location and a time and Liam is going to have to be there and he's going to take another life. He's going to take that life and bring it back here and that poor soul is probably going to suffer the same fate Liam’s been subjected to as well.

And he doesn't want that. Liam is tired of standing on the sidelines and watching people die, letting them die, and doing nothing about it. It's happened too many times and he isn't entirely sure he can do it much longer.

“Soon,” Louis tells him, placing a comforting hand on Liam's knee and offering a smile. It's sad even though Liam knows Louis doesn't really mean for it to be that way.  He knows Louis was going for supportive and strong and optimistic, something Liam isn't feeling too much of at the moment. It doesn't really matter though. Liam is just glad that Louis gets him in a way that nobody else ever has; that he just knows without Liam having to tell him.

Liam nods, covering Louis' hand with his own just to feel grounded even though they're God only knows how far up in the sky.

“Soon,” Liam repeats. It will all be over soon.

+

The room isn't exactly full but it takes time to hand out assignments.

“There are different rooms,” Harry explains one time when the waiting room is fairly empty.  The four or five people ahead of Louis and Liam had been sent off on their assignments and now they were just... waiting.

“There are rooms for people who commit various degrees of sin. You know like, suicide, theft, murder...” Harry pauses. “Murder is a tough one, actually. The Bible says thou shalt not kill, but everything is subjective, you know. Killing to preserve one's life, for instance. Or the life of others...”

Liam thinks back to a few months before he died, before the semi and the bright flash of light and the lightning pain of impact. He remembers the hands that had been plastered to the rear window of the car, tears streaking down a face filled with fear as a boy screamed for Liam to help him.

He wonders if that qualifies as murder. He wasn't holding the gun. He never pulled the trigger, but he could have stopped it. He played a role.

Liam thinks about Louis, the empty cans and bottles they'd left behind at the park and the way he'd been wavering on the road.

He wonders if that counts as murder as well. They could have stayed and waited until they were better to drive. Louis never meant for them to die, but they did.

And then Liam remembers the body lying on the ground covered in blood and he knows it was murder. Liam can feel the knots in his back, the scars scabbing and healing over. There’s no denying it; no taking it back. 

“And then there are people like you,” Harry says, eyes drifting from Liam to Louis and back again. “People who are here sort of... coincidentally. Not by any real fault of your own be it fear or bad decision making.” Harry looks at Liam, a knowing look in his eyes. “Somewhere along a path of right turns, you made wrong one and now you have your chance to make it right.”

+

There were times back when Liam was alive when he would look in the mirror and he wouldn't recognize the person looking back.

He'd be brushing his teeth and he'd catch his own eye in the mirror and stop because the boy looking back at him resembled Liam, but he wasn't sure that it really was. Liam wouldn't leave a boy behind like that, wouldn't let him get dragged off and killed. He wouldn't have let fear take over his body; he would have done something.

And then Louis would hold his hand and steal his beers and laugh while he told jokes that weren't that funny and Liam would wonder if Louis would still be laughing if he knew; if he'd want to touch Liam, let alone hold his hand, if he knew what kind of a person his best friend was.

Liam used to remember that boy and the drugs that had been stowed away in his pocket and he'd think being a good person was bullshit and it's too hard and he'd he didn't feel so bad.

There were times when Liam would look in the mirror and he wouldn't recognize the person looking back and he'd want it all to be over. 

+

Louis' eyes are closed when Liam stands from his chair. He's not sleeping, but Liam likes to call it dozing. He's in that space where he's not quite asleep but not quite awake either. Sort of like purgatory; not quite dead, but also gone.

“You know, don't you?” Liam says when he reaches Harry's desk. He's felt Harry's eyes on him for what feels like days but may have only been minutes or hours. There's no sense of time here; no way to tell how long.

Harry nods, setting paperwork down on the desktop, folding his arms in front of himself. “Yeah,” he says. “But that's sort of my job: to know.”

“It wasn't an accident,” Liam tells him. “I made a choice.”

Harry nods again. “Yes.”

“I killed him,” Liam says. “And that other guy too.”

The flash of a man, screaming, and a boy being dragged toward a car. The neighborhood is sketchy so nobody cares to notice. Liam follows but there's a blow to his gut and then he's down, but he tries again. A gun.

(“ _Move and I shoot_.”)

Liam is stationary. The boy – Zayn. His name was Zayn – is screaming and banging against the rear window. Liam can see his lips moving

(“ _Help! Help! Help!_ ”)

and then gas and he’s fading and fading and screaming and fading.

Rape. Murder.

Liam did nothing.

Harry nods. “Yeah.”

Liam doesn't expect that answer, doesn't expect Harry to appear so neutral and removed. He imagined people in Heaven to love and care and feel the way Louis does. But then Liam remembers this isn't Heaven, its purgatory, and maybe Harry is stuck in that middle ground between feeling and not. Maybe purgatory is everything in between and everyone is just stuck.

“I killed them. Its murder and... I'm here.”

Harry licks the dryness from his lips. “Did you mean it?”

Liam shakes his head. He doesn't need to think about it; not really. “No—” Liam stops, drags a hand over his face. “Yes, but no. Not him, but –”

“There's a balance, Liam,” Harry says. “Think of life like a scale. There's Heaven and Hell, Good and Evil, Living and Dead. There needs to be bad to even out the good. Sometimes people need to die so others can live.”

“Zayn didn’t need to die; I could have saved him,” Liam argues. ”And that other guy, he needed… he deserved—”

Harry smiles. It's sad and there's pity in his eyes and on his lips and Liam hates it. “Everything happens for a reason, Liam. There's a design, a pattern that must be followed.”

Liam shakes his head. “That's bullshit.”

Harry shrugs and moves to go back to his paperwork. He glances at the name on the top and smirks, handing the sheet over to Liam. “Maybe it is bullshit,” Harry says. “But it doesn't change the fact that Zayn is dead, you lost your wings, and now your number is up. Make it right.”

Liam looks down at the order and then back up at Harry. “But –”

Harry looks down at the name on the next form and hands it, face down, to Liam as well. He doesn't need to tell Liam not to look. “'But' doesn't matter, Liam,” he says. “'But' doesn't change anything. Now go get your friend and reap me some souls.”

+

“You're basically killing yourself,” Niall says tiredly as Zayn lights up another cigarette.

As he shifts on the bed, Zayn doesn’t think it’s quite like suicide. He doesn’t have the barrel of a gun pressed tight up against his temple or the sharp end of a razor digging into his skin. He’s not sitting in a bathtub holding his breath and waiting for the right moment to submerge himself under the water.

The only thing Zayn thinks he could really be guilty of is not caring. He smokes too much and he fucks too hard and he doesn’t eat right. He doesn’t listen to his doctors or pay attention to his parents. He ignores Niall’s sad eyes and disapproving stares and loses himself in alcohol and weed.

He does all the things he shouldn’t do but, then again, so does everyone else. Why should he have to be so different? Why should he and his shitty brain be so different from the rest of the world? Zayn figures he’s bound to die at some point and there’s nothing he can really do to avoid it – it’s as inevitable as the rising sun.

So when Niall asks him why he’s killing himself Zayn shakes his head and says it’s not quite like suicide. He’s not pulling the trigger, or dragging the razor across his skin. Zayn’s just ambivalent. He’s simply doing nothing at all. 

“You should at least try though,” Niall presses, folding his legs into the desk chair he's sitting on. “It's like you don't care.”

And maybe he doesn't. That's the whole point of ambivalence isn't it? Not caring at all. Zayn has no opinion on whether or not he wakes up the next morning. It's kind of pointless considering the mass in his head is pressing in on some important stuff in his brain and he could die at almost any moment. There's no point in caring about anything at all because he's only going to leave it behind.

“I just want to do what I want,” Zayn tells him. “I don't want to live careful and scared.”

And to some degree, Niall understands. He figures this is just Zayn reacting. It's Zayn feeling as though there isn't enough time and he needs to cram as much life into what time he has left as he can. But it's like he's filling his life with all the wrong things and he's wasting time and Niall just wishes Zayn would see that.

“I just want you to stay,” Niall answers quietly, looking down at his fingers.

Zayn's breath catches in his throat. This is one of those moments where Niall gets sentimental and Zayn remembers just how much Niall loves him. It's not even in _that way_ where the mere thought of Zayn makes Niall's stomach twist and turn in knots or like there are a million and one butterflies fluttering around in every possible direction. It's not even really like that even though it easily could be if they let it get that far. This is one of those moments where Zayn remembers that Niall would probably do anything for him and that all Niall really wants is for Zayn to be okay and happy and not so fucking sad and angry all the time.

This is usually where Zayn would climb off of the bed and kneel in front of the chair Niall is sitting in. He wouldn't say anything, just hold Niall's face in his hands and smile as he says that he's okay. No matter what, he's always okay; even when he's not. And Niall will scoff and shake his head and say something about Zayn just trying to avoid all the things he doesn't want to talk about. Zayn will laugh and shake his head, maybe drop it into Niall's lap and they'll sit there together. Niall will pet Zayn's hair and think about the brain underneath all the flesh and the bone and Zayn will stay even after the position starts to become uncomfortable because even though he may never admit so out loud in words, Niall is important to him and Zayn loves him just as much and he's one of the few things Zayn is truly afraid to leave behind. 

+

Earth is different every time Liam comes back. It doesn't feel like coming home simply because the trees and the grass and the people aren't the same as it had been when Liam had been living in it. The old lady with all of the cats no longer lives down the street because she died and, when Liam thinks about it, he feels a bit sad that he never saw her.

Earth sort of just makes Liam sad because everything has changed and he's missed it. It makes him sad because he never enjoyed it the way he should have while he had the chance and now all Liam has is a contract and another soul to reap before he goes back to purgatory to do it all over again.

And this is Liam's life now only it's really not a life at all.

“Susan Montgomery,” Liam says out loud, glancing down at the form in his hand. “She's thirty-four. Two kids. Supposed to be on the highway when she goes.”

“Car accident?” Louis asks, looking down at his own form. It's almost like he doesn't notice all the people around him; teenagers laughing with their friends as they pass him by. They're kids the same way Liam and Louis had been when they died only they have so much time ahead of them. They smile the way Louis used to smile; the way Liam never really did.

“Falling asleep at the wheel, apparently. She just had a baby.”

Louis frowns. “That's not fair.”

Liam shakes his head, shoves the form back into the manila envelope it had come in. “It's not her fault.”

“I know,” Louis says. “But... I don't know. I guess it's just sad. This is the bad part and I hate having to do it and I know it's all God's plan and there's a reason for everything but that doesn't mean... It's still not fair.”

It's one of the few times Liam has ever heard Louis say anything remotely negative when it came to God and he can't help but to let his mind linger on the belief of a plan; like this woman is meant to die and that's all there is to it. There is no way around it and it may not be fair, but this is the way it needs to be.

And Liam thinks it’s bullshit. There are ways around it; nobody has to die. Liam thinks people deserve lives and it's nobody's right just to take them away because of a _plan_. It’s counterproductive, Liam thinks. God gave people free will but he also instilled this stupid, bullshit plan that defeats the whole purpose of making your own decisions and deciding your fate. It’s a lie. All of it is a lie and Liam hates it.

Liam sees their faces when he leads them into the matrix. He sees the fear in their eyes and feels the sadness of leaving everything behind. He hates being the one to take their hand and rip them away from everything they have ever known. He hates knowing they believe this was done by their own hand; that they made the decisions leading to this very event when that’s really not even the case.

All because of a plan.

“It's such bullshit,” Liam mumbles.

Louis looks at Liam and sighs; reaches out to give him a soothing pat on the shoulder. “I know,” he says. “But it's just the way things are. Good and bad right?”

Liam turns back to his friend and envies his easy acceptance; the way it's so simple for him to trust that this is right even though it feels so wrong. “Yeah,” Liam agrees. “Good and bad.”

+

The way Zayn saw it, people died and that was all there was to it. There was a line, he figured, and everyone was sort of just waiting for their number to be called. There wasn’t any real rhyme or reason to it. People were born and they lived and then they died and some people lived longer than others and that was all there was to it.

It just kind of sucked that Zayn pulled his ticket too early and was stuck with a number so close to being called.

The feeling was even more apparent every time he had to come into the hospital for one of his routine check-ups. The hospital always left Zayn feeling hopeless and tired and he was so tired of being tired. Zayn was sick of watching his parents hover and worry over his every move. He was tired of the same news of “no change is better than bad change” and “we’ll keep trying.”

It was only a matter of time and Zayn had accepted it; he just wished everyone else would accept it too.

He’s there with Niall today because his parents couldn’t get out of work. Niall is fidgeting and looking at his fingers and trying to avoid looking at all of the other sick people waiting to be called in.

Waiting for their number, Zayn thinks.

Waiting to die.

Zayn sort of likes it sometimes, waiting. He likes sitting in the hard plastic chairs and watching the people move in and out and around the room. He likes watching the doctors come in with their overly friendly smiles as they beckon in the familiar faces of their sick patients. He sort of enjoys it all even though most of it feels forced and fake. He likes the look of boredom and redundancy on the other patient’s faces because it’s the only time he sees anything that feels real. It’s the only time Zayn doesn’t feel so alone.

“Good news today, maybe,” Niall says, breaking the silence between them.

Zayn shrugs his shoulders and grunts out a noncommittal response. He appreciates Niall’s optimism but he doesn’t really want it.

Across the room he spots two unfamiliar faces. Two boys sitting and staring and waiting. He knows most of the people here even though he’s never really spoken to any of them. Zayn can’t help but to notice the way the pair of them keep glancing at him, one of them peeking into a folder before looking back at Zayn.

The other one is just watching. He watches Zayn like he knows him without ever saying so much as hello. Looking back at him, Zayn can’t help but to feel as though he knows him too; like he’s seen him before in a dream or an apparition.

Zayn closes his eyes for a moment and feels cold glass against his palms, a tightness in his throat and it’s like he’s screaming at the top of his lungs. When he opens them again, Zayn is staring back into chocolate brown and all he can see is fear.

“Hey,” Niall says glancing back and forth between Zayn and the two boys on the other side of the room. “You know them?”

Zayn cocks his head to the side, drags a hand over his face and thinks he must be tired. He needs coffee or a nap or something that isn’t waiting rooms and hospitals and dying faces. “No,” he answers. “I don’t.”

+

Liam and Louis are standing on the side of the highway when it happens. It still makes him flinch even though he’s expecting it. Liam can feel the harsh impact of Susan’s head hitting the wheel, the strain of the seatbelt digging into her flesh, the ringing of the horn in his ears. Louis doesn’t really look just because it hurts too much. Louis doesn’t really do cars or highways – not anymore – and Liam knows seeing another person die in one hasn’t gotten any easier for him.

Liam stands and stops and stares; watches as Susan’s body seems to deflate inside of the mess of what used to be her car. He can feel it when the last breath leaves her lungs and watches her spirit leave her body.

Now is where he should make his move, when she’s standing over her body feeling so lost and outside of herself. Now, when she’s looking at a beaten and battered shell of herself and wondering what’s supposed to happen next. Liam knows this is when he should get over there and offer her a hand and an explanation as he leads her in through the matrix and onto the next life; to heaven or purgatory where things won’t make that much more sense, but might be a bit better than this. Liam knows this is what he should be doing but all he can see is a boy in a waiting room who seemed to know who he was without ever learning his name. All Liam can see are golden eyes staring back at him in a stark white room and a rigid palm banging against the back of a car as a frightened boy screams for help.

“I don’t—” Liam starts and then stops. He can feel his body willing him forward but he can’t bring himself to move.

“She’s waiting,” Louis says, chancing a glance at Susan. She’s standing a few feet away from the scene, watching as people mill around the car, listening to the shocked gasps and the shaking voice of a woman calling for help.

Liam can see the fear in her eyes but it’s nothing compared to the way Zayn had looked at him as he was dragged into the back of that car.

“I need time.” Liam’s voice is shaky and so not his own and he’s scared. He can still feel the dull ache of what used to be in his shoulder blades, imagines an entire afterlife of being reminded of what a failure he is.

“You don’t have time, Liam,” Louis says, looking at his friend. “She’s waiting. The door, the matrix, it’s open. You have to take her.”

Liam looks toward the matrix, watches it swirl and sees the faint image of everyone on the other side. He thinks about how easy it would be to grab Susan and bring her over, to get his wings back and wait for Louis back in Heaven. He thinks about how easy it could be not to feel so miserable.

And then he sees the blood on the floor, hears the screams ringing in his ears, remembers the funeral and the way Zayn’s mother had cried at that memorial they’d had in the school auditorium.

Liam shakes his head. “I can’t,” he says, looking at Louis just before he turns away. “It’s not my time.”

He doesn’t hear Louis calling after him, not really. There’s the faint sound of his name and questions about him not realizing what he’s doing – what it all means – but Liam doesn’t really hear any of it. It’s all something akin to white noise or a rush shooting through his ears.

All Liam can see is the scared, lost expression on Susan’s face and the strange recognition on Zayn’s when he’d seen him back at the hospital. All Liam can see is the chance to finally make things right even if it means upsetting a balance and pissing off a God Liam has seen but still doesn’t quite believe in.

And then Liam stops. He turns around and looks back toward the highway. The matrix is gone and he can no longer see Susan’s soul wandering aimlessly around the scene. 

“I just want to help him,” Liam says quietly, eyes trained on the ground when he knows Louis is within earshot.

Liam wonders if she made it through. If Susan saw the mystical swirl of the matrix and figured out the portal was there for her. He wonders if Susan is just as scared walking through heaven alone as she had been on earth.

Liam thinks, or knows, that he should have gone with her. He knows it was the right thing; nobody deserves to be alone.

But neither does Zayn. Zayn doesn’t deserve to be alone either and Liam can see it in his eyes. He can see how lonely and angry Zayn is at everything and Liam knows the feeling; that helpless sinking feeling that sits in the pit of his stomach that tells him that he is alone and that nobody understands. And Liam wants to help him in a way that he didn’t before.

 “It’s not going to be good when you go back, you know,” Louis says. “If you stay.”

It's not a warning so much as a reminder. Harry is going to see that woman walking into purgatory scared and shaking and alone and he's going to know it was Liam.

“Yeah.” A semi passes them by and Liam closes his eyes, winces as he feels the impact just before everything went black. Liam can still hear the shattering glass and Louis calling out his name before there was nothing but white noise. When he opens them again Louis is looking at him with that guilty expression that only shows when one of them remember how they got here in the first place. Liam shakes his head. “It doesn't matter,” he says. “If it’d be good or bad when I went back because –”

“I'm sorry,” Louis tells him quietly, glancing behind him where the semi is barely in view before it disappears completely. “I know you don't want to talk about it but –”

“Just do this for me, okay?” Liam says, cutting Louis off. “Just don't take him, okay? Just let me – let me try and help him. He doesn't deserve to die. Not yet.”

Louis knows it's a bad idea. He knows that this could ruin all chances of him getting into Heaven because when it comes down to it, Liam’s going to face judgment and Louis will more than likely be with him when that happens and when they realize he’d been holding out on a soul…

There are rules and there's a balance to things and leaving behind a soul that's supposed to pass will upset that balance and everything around it.

But Louis looks at Liam and he sees more than just his friend. He sees a boy who has been lost for so long, someone who has forgotten himself somewhere along the road and Louis thinks that maybe this is Liam's way of finding his way back.

Louis thinks that he took Liam's life and that maybe this is his chance to give him another.

“Okay,” Louis says, pushing his reservations to the back of his mind and nodding his head in agreement. “Okay. I'll do it. I won't take him.”

+

Harry is waiting when Susan wanders into purgatory, face riddled with fear and confusion of the unknown. He waits a moment, two, three, then sighs when Liam doesn’t follow because deep down, Harry had known all along.

“Come,” Harry says, extending a hand toward Susan, beckoning her forward. “We have work to do.”

Susan takes his hand and Harry thinks it’s warm and fresh, he can almost feel the blood coursing through her veins even though he knows it can’t be. Her hands are shaking and, for the first time in a countless number of years, Harry tries to remember what it’s like. He turns back to the matrix, pauses to admire the mesmerizing twist and swirl of the colors.

On the other side there’s the faint sound of a voice calling out time of death and when Harry looks back at her, Susan’s eyes have grown impossibly wider.

For the first time in years Harry feels the sharp pang of guilt deep in his chest, an emotion he’d thought he’d long grown out of.

“It’s a plan,” Harry says softly to himself, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose with his free hand. He grips tighter on to Susan’s with the others and if he didn’t know any better he’d swear he can feel her bones cracking. “A design; a natural order to things.

And Harry can hear Liam’s voice in the back of his head.

(“ _That’s bullshit._ ”)

Harry groans, tries to ignore Susan’s quiet sobs, the weak cries for her children being muffled by the press of the back of her hand to her mouth.

“I’m doing God’s work.”

And Harry believes it to be true; believes it to be right when he draws in a deep breath and exhales heavily. Harry Clears his mind of all doubt and reason when he straightens his back and readjusts his grip on Susan’s hand.

“Come,” he says. “We have work to do.”

+

Niall likes it when Zayn gets tired.

It’s when Zayn’s eyes feel droopy and his head hurts and his limbs feel too heavy to move that Zayn is really honest. It’s when he looks at Niall and says all the things he’s afraid to say when his brain is working at full capacity and Zayn has to worry about things like being judged or putting too much of himself out there.

It’s times like now, when Zayn’s head is pillowed in Niall’s lap and Niall is petting his hair and humming a song they’d heard on the radio earlier that day under his breath that he feels closest to his best friend. Because if Niall were to close his eyes and ignore the pill box with the “Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday….” Written on the individual squares and disregard the insistent smell of weed in Zayn’s room it’s almost as though Zayn had never gotten sick in the first place. It’s like that doctor’s visit at fourteen never happened and Zayn is happy and healthy and maybe sometimes Niall could kiss Zayn without the pretense of providing comfort and temporary stability.

“Sometimes,” Zayn says quietly, eyes still closed as he drags his tongue over his lips. “I feel so scared.”

Niall feels close to Zayn on his bad days. It’s when Zayn finally lets his guard down and allows himself to be held and cared for. It’s when Niall can comb his fingers through Zayn’s hair and kiss his forehead and tell almost-lies about everything being okay.

“That’s okay,” Niall tells him, nodding his head. “It’s okay to be scared.”

“It’s just so…” Zayn squeezes his eyes shut tight, lifts his hands to rub at his temples as his head throbs. “It’s so stupid. Everything is so stupid.”

“I know,” Niall says honestly.

When Zayn opens his eyes they’re sad and wet and it’s the first time Niall has seen Zayn cry in years. “I don’t get it,” he says. “I don’t get why it has to be me. I don’t get why _I_ have to be the one with this fucking tumor in my head and why _I_ only have so much time left to live.”

Niall usually likes it when Zayn gets tired because he’s usually just sated and only the slightest bit irritated by the constant pounding in his head. He usually goes off on tangents about all the kids he’s not missing from school and his parents constantly breathing down his neck. Niall can usually take this time to enjoy simply being with Zayn while he has the time. Because as much as Niall hates to admit it, he knows that Zayn is right.

There is only so much of it left.

“I feel like I’m dying,” Zayn says, his voice barely over a whisper. He wipes at his eyes, tries to tell himself that it’s just the pills and the headache that are making him so emotional even though he knows that’s not the case. “Like, I know I’m dying, but I feel like it’s so much closer.”

“No. You’re not dying; you’re right here with me,” Niall tells him, shaking his head as he forces on a smile. It’s almost difficult to push the words out of his mouth because he knows they’re not all the way true. As much as Niall wants to deny it, with the way Zayn is living it’s only a matter of time. But he says it anyways; repeats himself in the hopes that he’ll believe it too.

“You’re not dying,” he repeats. “You’re right here with me and you’re not dying.”

Niall watches the twitch of Zayn’s mouth, sees the brief flash of protest in his eyes before Zayn sighs and nods his head. He’s too exhausted to argue, Niall thinks, and for this he is glad because Zayn simply sinks back into Niall’s lap and closes his eyes. He lets himself slip back into that hazy space where he’s both asleep and awake and mumbling noncommittal nonsense as he settles into the steady rise and fall of Niall’s breathing.

And Niall is glad as he goes back to humming that song from the radio because Zayn is too tired again and maybe, if he tries hard enough, Niall thinks he can go back to pretending.

+

He never said anything, but Zayn could feel it in the hospital. It was like his heart had stopped, his chest going tight as all of the air left his lungs and then everything went black.

Zayn could feel it ending before it even began.

It wasn’t like all of the other times when he would sometimes drink too much and black out only to wake up the next morning unable to remember what had happened the night before. And it wasn’t like all those times when he’d take too many pills on purpose just to feel something other than numb even though the pills made him kind of boneless and lazy and all he’d really want to do is sleep.

This felt final; out of his control.

Then his palms felt cold and heavy and Zayn could hear himself screaming but he wasn’t making a sound.

And when Zayn opened his eyes it was that boy looking at Zayn as though he knew him and the eerie feeling that Zayn knew him as well.

+

Louis can tell from the beginning that this is more than what is fair and unfair. It’s more than being too soon or not soon enough. It’s not just Susan Montgomery and her newborn baby and Liam feeling as though maintaining balance is silly and unnecessary.

He can tell while they’re watching Zayn and that blonde kid from the hospital walk out of a liquor store, Zayn shoving a fresh pack of cigarettes into his back pocket while Niall drinks from a bottle of coke that Liam is in deep.

It’s the way Liam watches him, the wave of guilt and sorrow that flashes in his eyes that throws Louis off and he doesn’t understand. It’s the way he watches Zayn as though he’s in a trance; like he’s seeing someone who isn’t really there.

“Liam,” he says, placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder.

Liam jolts, blinks for a few moments as he comes to and looks back at Louis. Chancing a quick glance back at Zayn, Liam feels shaken. Every time he looks at him he sees a boy being dragged into the backseat of a car, hears him calling out for help and slamming his palms against the back window of a car. And then he’s just a boy, a ghost of sorts, buying cigarettes and walking down the street with his friend as if nothing had ever happened.

But Liam can still smell death on his skin, he can see it lurking behind him, following him and watching Zayn’s every move. It’s counting down the days and hours and seconds and minutes and Zayn doesn’t even know.

“How much longer?” Liam asks, turning back to Louis. “When is he supposed to go?”

“Tomorrow,” Louis tells him.

“How?”

“Brain aneurism.” Louis says it with a sad sense of finality because they both know there’s no saving him.

“I…”

Liam frowns, digging the heels of his hands into his eyes as he sighs in frustration. When he looks back up Zayn and his friend are sitting on the curb outside of the store, Zayn smoking a cigarette and the boy saying something that causes Zayn to laugh as he exhales smoke.

And they have no idea.

It’s tomorrow and they have no idea.

+

Zayn falls asleep on the floor of Niall’s bedroom and dreams about pills and the strangely familiar boy from the hospital waiting room.

There are hands shoving him into the backseat of a car, a gun, and that boy staring back at him, helpless, before fading into something dark and distant.

And then there were rough hands against his skin, the harsh burn of denim being pulled down his legs and a feeling of too much too soon before everything went black.

Zayn doesn’t remember dying, but he feels it nearly every day. It’s the stupid tumor in his head, mocking him, threatening to take his life at any moment. It’s his parents loving him too much and Niall skirting around the issue of being alone. It’s Zayn simultaneously not caring and being extremely bothered by the lack of control he holds over his own life.

He doesn’t remember dying, but he remembers that night in bits and pieces, feels the guilt and the fear and the strange recognition in that other boy’s eyes and Zayn somehow knows that it’s coming.

+

Liam and Louis are standing outside of Niall’s house when it happens.

Niall is screaming and crying and yelling into the phone about seizures and vomit and “ _please, please, please, just send an ambulance or something. Please.”_

Louis can’t make out all of the words because Niall keeps sobbing between sentences and calling out Zayn’s name and begging him to hold on and _“stay with me a little bit longer; they’re coming.”_

When Louis turns to look at Liam, he looks lost; like he isn’t sure of where he is. He’s staring into Niall’s bedroom window, eyes fixed on the dark haired boy lying on the ground with vomit pooling around his lips and eyes that are totally and completely unfocused and Louis has no idea what Liam is thinking.

“I –”

Liam shakes his head. “Not yet, just…”

Louis had never been sure of what the plan was; if Liam had this idea that he’d somehow be able to save Zayn and keep him from dying. All he knows is that time is running out and Harry could show up at any moment if he doesn’t go and take Zayn away.

He knows he made a promise, but there’s a balance to things and Zayn is lying there convulsing on Niall’s bedroom floor suffering and Louis has the power to make it all go away.

“It’s just like before,” Liam says quietly. “There’s nothing I can do; I can’t make it stop. I can’t help him.”

Niall is sitting on his heals behind Zayn, making sure he’s on his side as his body continues to shake and then it all suddenly stops. Everything stops. There are the faint sounds of sirens in the distance and Louis knows that means the ambulance is almost there, but he’s pretty sure it’s too late.

“What do you…? What should I do?” Louis asks because whether Liam likes it or not, Zayn’s dead.

Liam’s face is blank. He’s looking at Niall who’s shaking Zayn’s lifeless body and begging him to wake up. Telling him that he has so much to live for if he just wakes up. He can hear the desperation in his voice and the uncertainty and the fear. He can tell that Niall has no idea what he’s doing, that he feels guilty for not having done more before it all happened.

But then, Liam thinks, at least he tried.

“It’s just like before…”

Only this time it’s different because Zayn is standing and staring, looking down at his own body covered in sweat and the toast he’d eaten for breakfast. He’s looking at Niall and Liam can tell that he feels so sorry for leaving him behind.

He hadn’t gotten the chance to see Zayn after he’d died the first time and seeing him now somehow makes it so much worse.

“Before…” Louis repeats.

Liam shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter.”

“You know him?”

It’s then that Zayn spots them, sees Liam and Louis standing outside Niall’s bedroom. He furrows his brow as he takes in Liam’s face and then his eyes widen and that’s how Liam knows Zayn remembers.

The paramedics are parked just outside of Niall’s house, one of them jumping out the back of the ambulance and rushing to bang on Niall’s front door. Niall sobs something about being right back even though Zayn’s shell of a body wouldn’t notice him leaving either way before he goes to answer the door and let the medic in. He still lingers anyway though, making sure Zayn’s body stays turned over on its side as though he could choke on his own vomit and die all over again.

Then again, that’s not entirely impossible. Liam’s sent him to his death twice already.

Zayn watches it all happen, following Niall through the house and out of the front door. He stands behind him while two men rush into the house to retrieve Zayn’s body and Niall explains what all happened to the third. He reaches out to place a hand on Niall’s shoulder, but it goes straight through him.

Zayn’s there, but he isn’t. He’s standing right there, but he’s so far out of reach and it’s the way Liam has been feeling this entire time. Saving Zayn was so close and so far, he could reach out and offer a hand for as long as he wanted, but Zayn would never be able to take it.

It just wasn’t in the design, the balance; the fucking order.

Zayn looks at him and he doesn’t need to say it. He knows. He looks at Liam and he knows, remembers how it all happened.

Buying the pills.

The man holding them at gun point.

Getting dragged into the car and Liam not being able to do a thing about it.

“I’m sorry.”

Louis doesn’t know what for, but Zayn nods.

“I know.”

The portal back to purgatory is ready and waiting. Harry is on the other side, waiting to see what happens, knowing that this soul is different from all the rest. He knows this is more than Susan Montgomery or a John Doe.

Liam can see the way Zayn looks back at Niall sitting on his porch with his head in his hands as they carry Zayn’s lifeless body toward the back of the ambulance. He can tell that he wants to go back, maybe try a little harder to live like he wasn’t just waiting to die.

Liam is saying it before he can really even process the words.

“Go,” he says, turning to Louis. “Go back.”

Louis’ eyes widen. “What?” He shakes his head. “I’m not going back without you or – or him or… Liam.”

Zayn is standing, confused. He can see white halls and a dark figure with a mass of curly hair standing at the end, but he isn’t sure where it all leads to. He sees the determination in Liam’s eyes and the fear and longing in his friend’s, but Zayn doesn’t know what any of it means.

He doesn’t know what any of it means. Zayn can’t tell if he’s alive or dead or somewhere in between. He saw his body lying lifeless on the floor of Niall’s bedroom, but he can also hold out his arms and see his hands outstretched in front of him. Zayn is in two places at once and his mind is everywhere. He remembers this life, but also the one before and Zayn has no idea what any of it means.

“Just go back. Go back and tell Harry I wouldn’t let you do it. Tell him that everything happens for a reason and I just – I had to make things right.”

It’s then that it all sort of dawns on him. Louis can see the determination in Liam’s eyes and he just knows exactly what he plans to do. Louis shakes his head, his eyes welling up with tears he won’t dare let fall.  “No.”

“I owe him. I can… Louis, I might – this could save him.”

“It’s your _soul_.”

“It’s damned anyways.”

“No it’s not.”

Liam looks back at Zayn who is watching everything unfold with wide eyes. The ambulance is long gone and Niall is still sitting on the porch, eyes rimmed red as he stares blankly ahead of himself. It’s like watching Zayn’s family the first time around all over again only this time it’s in person and not on the news. A man in a perfectly tailored suit isn’t relaying information about the family’s sorrow. Liam is seeing it in real time.

“You don’t – you don’t know what I’ve done,” Liam says, turning back to look at Louis. “I – I had a chance to save him once and I didn’t do it and now… now I can.”

Louis starts to object but clamps his mouth shut when he sees the way Liam looks back at Zayn. He’s never really understood the tortured undertones in Liam’s every movement and word and he still doesn’t, but he can see that this is something Liam needs to do in order to be okay even if it means giving every last bit of himself to another person. Somehow Louis knows that taking Zayn and forcing Liam back to purgatory would be killing him all over again and that’s not something Louis thinks he could do.

“You’re sure?” Louis asks him.

Liam nods, a sad smile on his face as he places a hand on Louis’ shoulder. “Thank you.”

+

Zayn wakes up in a hospital room hooked up to machines that are buzzing and whirring all around him. His head is pounding and there are cords and wires coming out of what feels like every inch of his body, but it’s the first time in his entire life that he’s ever felt alive.

His parents are sleeping in two chairs a few feet from his bed and he can see where Niall is slumped against the wall in the hallway just outside his hospital room.

When they wake, Zayn’s parent’s smile and cry and kiss his face, hugging him until he feels as though he might stop breathing all over again. Niall stands next to his bed and stares, amazed that Zayn is still alive and breathing after he’d watched him die on in a pool of his own vomit.

Later, when his parents are gone talking to his doctors, Niall is seated in one of the plastic chairs next to Zayn’s bed. “What happened?” He asks because he honestly can’t remember any of it. Niall talks about ambulances and sirens and how his heart had been stopped for so long.

“I didn’t believe it at first. The medic, he said it was like an act of God. Like, there was this flash of light when they brought you in and you were just – you were back, you know? It was like something breathed life back into you and you were just… I don’t know.”

Niall shakes his head, eyes bright and shining as he stares down at his friend. “I missed you so much,” he says with a laugh, thick with tears as he wipes at his eyes. “You were only gone for a little while, but I felt like I’d been missing you for so long.”

Zayn nods, reaching out to take Niall’s hand as he feels his own eyes grow wet as well. “I missed you, too.”

+

It won’t hit him until later, but when it does it will feel like a wave.

The boy with the brown eyes who’d seen him in this life and the last. He’ll remember feeling the guilt and the gratitude coursing through dead veins as he’d taken Zayn’s hands and told him to close his eyes, draw in a deep breath before releasing it long and slow.

And then Zayn felt this warm glowing feelings throughout his entire body, like life being breathed right into him; like souls intertwining and becoming one. That’s how Zayn knows he’s with him; that his soul isn’t entirely his own as much as it is theirs.

And that in itself gives him so much life.

 


End file.
